Description

Last updated at 10:27, 19 Mar 2015Uploaded at 22:15, 1 Mar 2012

No custom animation possible for Skyrim? Wrong. FNIS Behaviors allows other mods to add different types of animations to the game: idles/poses, sequenced, arm offset, furniture, and paired animations, killmoves, and creature animations.And, with the demonstration mod FNIS Spells the user has a means to display almost all animation files. Dance animations included.

Note: You will have to run a generator toolGenerateFNISforUsers.exe (part of FNIS Behavior) every time you have installed or uninstalled FNIS, or an FNIS based mod. Or when new Skyrim versions have changed behavior files.

Never installed FNIS before? Check out the article Installation Guide FNIS / GenerateFNISforUsers.exeYou are a modder, and interested in Behaviors? Download FNIS for Modders Documentation V5.1 (or later) from the Files section You are a modder, and want to understand the contents of behavior files?CondenseBehavior represents Behaviors in a condensed formWant to see creatures animated by custom FNIS behaviors? Go and get FNIS ZooBored of all females walking the same?FNIS Sexy Move will change that

Multi-language support: Anyone willing to translate the Generator text? Right now I need help with translating the additional FNIS 5.2 text pieces for all available languages, except English and German. But I would also appreciate any new language not yet covered.

Gamers can use it to make characters perform any standard or custom idle by simply copying the (.hkx) animation file under a pre-defined name into a special directory, and activate them by casting the FNIS spells. Note: although there can be different NPCs performing different animations at one time, this mod does not provide any synchronization of these animations, as needed for example in some adult type animation mods.

Modders can generate behavior files to add new idle animations to their mods. To hook these new behavior files into the sytem, it is necessary to modify 4 original behaviors (0_master.hkx, defaultmale.hkx, defaultfemale.hkx, mt_behavior.hkx) for characters, and similar files for each creature for which an FNIS dependent mod exists. Because of the anti-modding structure of these behaviors, my mod will always be incompatible to all other mods which modify these files as well. To make 2 behavior modifying mods compatible, they have to be integrated into one set of behaviors. That's why GenerateFNISforUsers.exe has an integrated "Patch Management", which takes care of necessary Behavior changes for other behavior changing mods, like PC Exclusive Animation Path.

FNIS animations can be used for all kind of simple animation tasks, (hopefully) including idle based combat overhauls like Oblivion's DR6 and CCAO. However due to the lack of necessary behavior information they cannot be used for regular combat animations.

FNIS Spell Selector: This (self) spell allows you to select 1 of 72 Idle Animation which will be used for the next Idle Spells (NPC or player). By installation, most of these animations are pre-set with standard animations, but it also includes all 17 of Umpa's Dance Animation for Modder (animations C10 to C26), and dualsun's Funny Animations And Idles (animations C28 to C34, A1 to A4). For a complete list of the used spells, see Data/meshes/actors/character/animations/FNISSpells/FNIS_Animations.txt.

FNIS NPC Idles: This (target) spell makes the casted NPC perform the selected idle. On standing NPCs the idle will run until you interrupt by casting again. But unfortunately, in some cases the animation can be also interrupted by or blended with the movement of other standard animation of the NPC's regular animation schedule.

FNIS Player Idles: This (self) spell forces the player into 3rd person and makes her perform the selected idle. The will run until you interrupt, e.g. by jumping up (space bar).

If you want to cast animations of your choice, you can simply replace the files in meshes/actors/character/animations/FNISSpells by your own files:

Skyrim uses 2 gender specfic behavior files (defaultfemale.hkx, defaultmale.hkx) to list ALL animation files used in the game. These files cannot be used for different compatible mod changes. One mod will always overwrite other mods default files. Therefore FNIS attempts to incorporate changes made by other mods (fortunatley there are not many). This is done with the GenerateFNISforUsers.exe "Patch Management". However, FNIS will not include other (animation) files from these mods. So if you want to use the patches, you will still have to install these mods as well, before running the generator.

SKELETON arm fix: this change (originally introduced by mirap for CHSBHC) fixes arm animation glitches in many animations, caused by the additional bones in custom skeletons. This patch checks for the actually installed skeletons (female and male), and applies skeleton specific modifications to the behavior files.

Note: the generator currently recognizes the CHSBHC, XPMS, and TBBP skeletons, but will also work for all complete skeleton definitions (with both .nif AND .hkx files). However, skeletons with INCOMPLETE definition (no .hkx files) like "The skeleton of female models" or "Custom Skeleton Replacer" CANNOT be properly patched.

GENDER specific animations: in Skyrim only a few animations are defined gender specific (different animations in the "Animations/female" and "Animations/male" folder. This patch allows you to make other animations gender specific provided they are "properly" created by the animators, see the Note). If you want to use such animations (e.g xp32's New Animation Pack, dualsun's Pretty Combat Idles, or NonokuraSan's Female Animation Pack), simply copy them into your "Animations/female" (or "male"), and use this patch.

Important Note: Some custom animations may cause strange effects when used with GENDER, especially most combat animations from the Female Animation Pack, but I can't exclude other animation files and replacers. This is caused by animation duration differences between vanilla and custom, resulting in animation events being triggered in the behaviors AFTER the end of a custom animation. Most (not all) effects disappear when you install the FAP animations as downloaded (combat animations NOT in female).

I'm getting Error messages when I call GenerateFNISforUSers.exe. What can I do?All error codes greater than 2000 are logical errors found by the Generator. Errors less than 2000 are reported by Windows. Most of the reports should be self-explanatory. Before you can work with FNIS, you need to solve all errors shown in the textfield. Also look at the warnings. They can also indicate problems that prevent FNIS from working properly (like incompatibilities). Some specific error messages:

Error 5 (Access denied): You have to run as Administrator. Right-click on the Generator (in in Explorer, or on the desktop Link) and click "Run as Administrator".

Error 53 (File not found): You probably have an incomplete installation -> Re-Install FNIS Behavior. If the problem persist then then this can be caused by an AntiVirus program giving a fals positive (WebRoot and SuperAntiSpyware have caused a lot of trouble in the past). Deactivate your AV during FNIS installation.

Error 2019 (Temporary directory does not exist. Bad Installation?): (1) You are running GenerateFNISforUSers.exe from a wrong place. Most likely from out of the archive file. DON'T do that. Or (2) you have an incomplete installation -> Download and Re-Install FNIS Behavior

("Animation Problems") After installing FNIS I suddenly have animations problems (stiff half-T pose, or other glitches). Why?Principally, FNIS Behaviors correctly installed and generated (without patches) add additional animations, and DO NOT INFLUENCE OTHER ANIMATIONS IN ANY FORM! There are a numer of possible causes, which can make FNIS look like it is breaking animations:

You have ignored ERRORS or WARNINGS in your last generator run. Don't do this. They are there for some reason.

You are running a cracked Skyrim. In the past apparant cracks have shown symptoms I have not seen in Steam versions.

Your game cache is corrupted. Run Steam Verify Cache (The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim -> RMB -> Properties -> Local Files -> Verify Integrity Game Cache ...). Another reason not to use cracks.

You have installed female animations with the FNIS Gender Patch. This is primarily effecting most combat animations from the Female Animation Pack, but I can't exclude other animation files and replacers. See the Note for "Patches"/"GENDER".

You run the Dragenborn DLC and use a custom dragon skeleton. Remove it.

Principally all DLCs and mods have bugs. Check the appropriate threads.

Skyrim was just updated. Usually it takes me a day or 2 to adapt FNIS to the new Skyrim updates, if necessary (usually Bethesda makes behavior updates ahead of planned DLCs).

I got the warning "Generator not run from a legal (Steam) Skyrim installation directory"This is a warning (only) that indicates, that your installation is not recognized as a legal steam installation. The generator is not effected by this. However, I will NOT support you with any installation problem you might have. Most users seeing this warning are using an illegal or pirated Skyrim copy (and don't have the proper registry information). And I don't support Skyrim pirates, and I don't want to track down possible problems caused by pirate installations.If you think you got a legal installation

if you have used "Steam Verify Cache", it might have removed one of the required registry entries. Start Skyrim once through the "Skyrim Launch" (and not through SKSE)

or, most likely, a hyperactive registry cleaner (CCLeaner?) has removed the registry entries used for this check. You can do a "quick" re-install (thanks to wtfmanreally):

1- Backup your Skyrim local files with Steam (right click on Skyrim in games library, Backup Game Files).2- Delete Skyrim local files from the library (right click on Skyrim, Delete Local Content...).3- In steam, go to Steam->Backup and Restore... and select Restore a Previous Backup, click on Next.4- Click on Browse and select the folder "The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim". Click on Next.5- From here on it will ask if you want to install the game. Everything else should run as a normal Steam install.6- Make a backup of your old load order (files in "X:/Users/Username/AppData/Local/Skyrim" and your old .ini files (.ini files in "Documents/My Games/Skyrim").7- Start Skyrim through your Games Library. This will bring up the launcher. Click on Play.8- Restore your load order and .ini files backups, since the official Skyrim launcher screwed them up.

("Load CTD") After I ran the generator, Skyrim aborts (CTD) when loading a save file. An FNIS bug?No. Skyrim's memory Management is buggy, and the more you add to Skyrim, the greater the likelyhood that you see CTDs, especially on save load. I personally have NO load CTD with 1500 animations, about 0.5 with 3000 animations, and about 3-6 CTD with 4000 animations before the game is loaded. Interestingly, once Skyrim starts sucessfully, an immediate re-load of the same file will almost always succeed, even with 4000+ animations. So there is an apparent dependency between memory usage and CTD frequency. Here my advice when you have an unacceptable CTD rate:

Install SKSE 1.7.0 Alpha or later. This will install "sheson's memory patch", which will not totally cure Skyrim, but geatly reduce CTD likelyhood. Make sure you have a Data/SKSE/skse.ini file with the following lines:

[Memory]DefaultHeapInitialAllocMB=768ScrapHeapSizeMB=512

Make a "clean save". Skyrim's problems to deal with updates of scripted mods is another big CTD cause.

At least temporarily reduce the number of FNIS based mods. Pinup Poser, for example, is a great mod. But I can't understand why user keep a pose mod active all the time when they suffer from frequent CTDs.

I installed FNIS Spells for the first time, but cannot find the spells in my magic inventory.FNIS Spells is not correctly installed or activated.

Check in your Steam "Data Files" if FNISSpells.esp is activated

Re-Install FNIS Spells, and make sure you say "No" when asked to "Update?"

Buy a legal Skyrim version. There are certain problems where "owner" of a pirated skyrim version are not able to activated plugins (.esp files)

When I cast an Idles Spell on a character, she stops for a split second, and continues her regular task. What can I do?Try using the spells on another character. Some characters execute high priority packages, which are not easy to interrupt

FNIS Spells worked fine in a previous version, but with the new version I have problems (don't get the spells, only some or none of the animations work, ... Why?

Make sure, FNIS Behavior and FNS Spells are properly installed

Try with different save files (one where you had not yet installed FNIS Spells, and one where you had not used FNIS spells for at least the last 3 minutes before save). If none of them work either, you have not installed properly.

If nothing works, you need to start from a "clean save".

What is a "clean save", and how can I make one?There are (hardly understood) mechanisms in the engine which cause problems with updates of scripted mods. The mixture of old save data, new scripts, quests, and objects can cause all kinds of problems. When it does not help to use another save, where FNIS Spells have not been used during the last 3 minutes, you should try with a "clean save"

Dismiss any follower

Go to a vanilla interior cell

Equip only vanilla equipment

Save and Quit

Deactivate all pugins that you want to update (or, all except Skyrim.esm and Update.esm)

Run, load the previous save, save again -> THIS is your "clean save"

Activate your plugins

There are more complicated "clean save" procedures reported, but they might only be necessary for more complicated mods

Why is it necessary to call GenerateFNISforUsers.exe every time I (re-)install or delete an FNOIS based mod?Behavior files were not intended by Bethesda to be moddable, so there is no native plugin interface for that. I'm aware that it was easier for the user with FNIS 2.1 and before. But it was impossible add some new FNIS features without a generator tool

Why is GenerateFNISforUsers.exe not integrated into the NMM installation?NMM's fomm/C# interface does not allow to start programs. I tried (really) ALL Nexus channels to make aware of the need, but unfortunately to no avail.

Is there a way to make it easier calling the generator tools?When you exit the generator tool (the 1st time) you are asked, if you want a link created on your desktop (with a clearly visible "F" icon). If you don't have this link yet, remove Data/tools/GenerateFNIS_for_Users/DontAskAgainForLink.txt, start the tool again, and exit.

I have uninstalled one of the mods which use FNIS Behavior. Now I get CTD when loading a save file.That's a sytem reaction when a behavior file is missing. Run GenerateFNISforUsers.exe and you should be fine again.

I want to run the Generator on Linux, but it cannot be run there because of .NET 4.x.Here is what you can do (thanks to hellgeist):1- On any version of Linux, install VirtualBox, put windows XP on it2- Update windows and Install .Net 43- Install Skyrim and patch it via Steam. 4- Use VMWare Tools to add a shared drive so you can port files between Linux and XP.5- Copy the Data folder from your main install on linux and overwrite the windows one.6- Install the ForesNewIdles in Skyim-FINIS mod, and run GenerateFNISforUsers.exe7- Make sure your main Linux data folder is backed up.8- Copy the updated Data folder from VirtualBox (Windows) Skyrim and overwrite your main one on Linux9- Close VirtualBox and run Skyrim.

I'm a modder and have a mod which conflicts with the behavior files modified by FNIS (0_master.hkx, defaultmale.hkx, defaultfemale.hxk). How can I be compatible with FNIS?Talk to me. If it's only a change in default(fe)male.hkx, I can add your mod as a patch. If you need a quick work-around for added file names, then you can create a (pseudo) FNIS mod, and in the file list have an entry like "b <pseudoAnimEvent> ../<animation file name>" (in case this animation file resides in Skyrims standard animation directory).

First, if you have the FNIS Creature Pack installed: Open the Generator and press "De-Install Creatures".Then deactivate both FNIS Behavior, FNIS Creature Pack, and FNIS Spells in NMM's Mods tab. That should take care of everything. To be totally sure that there are no behavior remnants, delete the following files, if they should still exist:

Data/Meshes/actors/character/behaviors/0_master.hkx

Data/Meshes/actors/character/behaviors/mt_behavior.hkx

Data/Meshes/actors/character/characters/defaultmale.hkx

Data/Meshes/actors/character/characters female/defaultfemale.hkx

Data/Meshes/animationsetdatasinglefile.txt

Data/FNISspell.esp

Manual Uninstalla

First, if you have the FNIS Creature Pack installed: Open the Generator and press "De-Install Creatures".After that, remove the following files or directories:

This mod is incompatible with every other mod which modifies the same behavior files 0_master.hkx, defaultmale.hkx, defaultfemale.hkx, or mt_behavior.hkx. Or similar files for the Skyrim creatures. However, when using the generator, FNIS will overwrite these files with it's own generated version (defaultfemale.hkx, defaultmale.hkx, mt_behavior.hkx, 0_master.hkx).

Ultimate Combat modifies more than any other mod I know of. This is not a problem for characters, since it does not change the same behaviors FNIS changes. But it will be incompatible for the following creatures (draugr, dwarvensteamcenturion, falmer, and giant). Provided you use an FNIS dependent mod that adds animations for these creatures. FNIS Zoo does, for example.

FNIS is incompatible with Animated Prostitution - Skyrim after download. According to the AP description, AP can be made FNIS compatible by removing the file "behavior/mt_behavior.hkx", and running the FNIS generator after AP's installation.

Some walking NPCs will just continue their way after a short interlude. So will most NPCs standing, leaning or sitting in dedicated places. I have implemented a 10-quest/quest idle management to make most casts successful. But there are still misses due to specific situations. To make these work it would be necessary to implement rather complicated packages (based on scenes). But I didn't think it's really worth this effort.

It's a little tricky to end the player's idles. Reason is that the CK doesn't provide an event for hitting a key (for interruption). The easiest way to end a player idle is to use space to jump up, then toggle to 1st to re-gain casting ability. Note: this spell DOES NOT change your standard idle(s). It only makes the the player character play the idle until you interrupt.

___________________________________________________________________________________Usage for MODDERS

The FNIS Behavior can only be downloaded and used in the described way. Without my express permission you are NOT ALLOWED

to upload FNIS Behavior TO ANY OTHER SITE

to distribute FNIS Behavior as part of another mod

to distribute modified versions of FNIS Behavior

You can use and modify FNIS Idle Spells in any way that does not prevent running (the original) FNIS Idles Spells in its described way. Simply give credit, and inform me when you include it into your mod.